THE HUSBAND SHE COULDN'T REMEMBER

by Maggie Shayne

  Ben hurried out the door into the darkness. He cupped his hands and called Penny's name, but heard only his own lonely echo on the wind. Adam was beside him before he even made it to the car. His shirt untucked, and belt hanging loose.

  "You okay, Ben?"

  Ben shook his head, and reached for the driver's door. "She was angry," he muttered, half to himself as he opened the door and leaned inside. The overhead light came on. "She saw me and Kirsten at the dojo and—"

  Adam's hand clasped his shoulder and yanked him out of the car again, so that he spun around and his back slammed against the side of the vehicle. "Saw you and Kirsten doing what?"

  "What do you think?" Ben shouted.

  Adam's face reddened, and he glared at Ben, his hands bunching Ben's shirt at the neck.

  "I swear, Ben, if you—"

  Ben looked at Adam, then looked down at Adam's hands on his shirt. "You know better. I'm your brother."

  Adam's face froze for just a second before it fell in shame. He let go of Ben's shirt and lowered his head. "I'm sorry. You're right, I know better. I don't know what the hell is the matter with me."

  "I do," Ben said. "But right now I want to find my wife, so we'll talk later." And he turned to lean into the car again.

  "So Kirsten came to see you at the dojo. Penny saw you together and jumped to the wrong conclusion," Adam said slowly. "But do you really think that's why she left?"

  Ben went still as he noticed the tiny droplets staining the upholstered headrest. He touched the spots with his fingertip, and found them still damp. "No," he said softly. "I don't think that's why she left." He straightened and turned to face his brother. "Adam, there's blood in the car."

  Adam swore and leaned in to see for himself. Ben felt sick, dizzy. "He couldn't have taken her far," he said. "I would have been right behind her if not for that damned flat— Oh, God," he muttered. "The flat, it was no accident. Couldn't have been."

  "So he had time," Adam said, still searching inside Chelsea's car. "He could have dropped the car here and taken her somewhere else. Everyone was probably in bed…" Adam was in the back seat now. "Or maybe he dropped her somewhere else and brought the car back," he said, then he got out.

  "She'd have run."

  "Maybe not." Adam held up the hypodermic he'd found in the back seat, and Ben's heart went icy cold.

  "He won't hurt her," Ben said softly. "How could he hurt her? He saved her life. He cured her. Why the hell would he hurt her now?" He kept saying those things over and over again. But in his mind's eye he was imagining the nurse, Michele Kudrow, brutally murdered in her own home. And he knew damned well that Penny was in danger.

  He'd promised to protect her. Always. And once again the means to do it had been wrenched from his hands. "No," he whispered. "Not this time."

  * * *

  Chapter 12

  « ^ »

  Penny opened her eyes slowly. And for just a second her mind played the strangest trick on her, and she thought she was only just now waking from the coma and that all the rest had been a dream.

  Only, if it had been, she wouldn't have known she'd been in a coma, would she?

  Confusion blurred her thoughts, as well as her vision. She felt drunk. Light-headed. And somewhere between giggling and crying. And then she thought of Ben, and the crying seemed more desirable. So she did. He didn't love her. He didn't come after her. She'd wanted him to, but he hadn't.

  No. She couldn't believe that. Maybe he hadn't come because he couldn't. God, what if Barlow had hurt Ben?

  "There, now, it's not as bad as all that," the doctor said from somewhere in this … this room. For the first time she wondered where she was, and her tears came to an abrupt halt at the sound of his voice. She looked again at the room around her, and her mind seemed to grasp that she wasn't at the ranch she'd begun to think of as home. She was in some different place. A place she didn't recognize.

  And the man of her nightmares sat in a chair opposite her bed, just watching her.

  "It's coming back to you now, is it?"

  She blinked. "I … you drugged me. You kidnapped me."

  "Unpleasant, all of it, but necessary, I promise you. No need to worry, though. The trauma of all this will soon be a thing of the past, Penny. You'll remember none of it soon enough."

  She sat up, battling the grogginess in her brain. "Let me go. Dr. Barlow, please, you have to let me go."

  "How much did you tell them, Penny?" He got to his feet and crossed the room to stand over her bed. "Not that it matters really. You're mine again now. And even if they know exactly who has taken you and why, they won't be able to find you."

  He adjusted a bag that hung from a pole, and Penny felt her pulse quicken as she saw it there, and traced its tubing to the spot where it disappeared into her arm. "What … what is that?"

  "Saline solution," he replied calmly. "Harmless. It's only here in preparation for the Senitrate. I'll inject that right into this IV the moment it arrives, and once you've had it you won't be so uncooperative, I promise. Had to have it shipped from London, you know. But it should be here this afternoon, and then we can be on our way."

  She shook her head. "I don't understand. What is it, this … Senitrate? Why do you want to give it to me?"

  Dr. Barlow frowned at her. "You haven't answered my question, Penny. And it's imperative you do. Soon you won't remember how much you told those Brands, so you'd best tell me now. What do they know?"

  "Nothing!" she blurted. "They've been trying to find out … where I was and why, but … but I couldn't remember and so I—"

  He shook his head. "Now you're lying to me."

  "No. It's the truth." She sat up slightly in the bed. "Why can't you let me go? I'll never tell anyone a thing about you or what you're doing. I swear—"

  "Your tranquilizer seems to be wearing off, doesn't it? Well, now, we can't have that." He pulled a prepared hypodermic from his deep pockets.

  "No!" She pulled away, but he gripped her arm and drove the needle into her. She cried out in pain—briefly. The pain faded fast, along with her consciousness.

  "Not as good as Senitrate," she heard him mutter. "But it will do."

  The rain began just after 4:00 a.m. It came in torrents, and it matched Ben's mood perfectly. He'd lost her. All over again he'd lost her.

  Worse than that, he'd let her leave the dojo last night without telling her how he felt about her. And dammit, that just wasn't acceptable. But he'd find her again.

  His horse was as wet as he was, but uncomplaining as he rode along between Adam and Jessi into a sodden bit of a scrub lot just off the main road.

  "Right about here," Ben said loudly, speaking into the wind. "One of the locals told Garrett there was a car pulled over here for a few minutes last night. It might have been Barlow with Penny."

  "Is that all we have?" Adam asked, huddling more tightly into his raincoat. "It could have been anyone. I can't believe no one saw anything more concrete!"

  "Garrett's got Texas Rangers all over town asking questions," Ben told his brother, though he understood the frustration. But if Adam thought he had the market cornered on worry, he was dead wrong. "He's doing the best he can."

  Jessi ignored them both to climb out of the saddle and hunker down in the soaking-wet grass. Ben and Adam looked at her, then at each other. If there was a sign left in all this rain, Jessi would find it. They both got down, as well, and, crouching low, examined the ground, inch by inch.

  "Here!" Jessi yelled.

  Ben's heart jolted in his chest, and for a moment he was certain he'd see his wife's body when he ran to where Jessi knelt in the tall grass. But he didn't. He didn't really see much of anything. Except a few broken blades.

  "This is where he walked in from the road. You see?"

  Ben knelt down and looked back toward the road where she pointed. And in a moment a pattern seemed to solidify in the grass. Trodden places formed a path. He turned the other way, but Jessi was way ahead of him, followin
g where it led.

  "Looks like only one person, though," she was saying. "Maybe it wasn't them…" Her words trailed off as she came to a stop.

  Ben caught up, and then he saw why. This place where the grass was all flattened was much larger. As if someone had been lying down on it.

  The ramifications shook him to the core, but he refused to believe what he was thinking. "It could have been a deer," he said, though he knew his voice lacked conviction. "Or a couple of deer … they just bedded down here for the night, is all."

  Jessi got down on hands and knees. "She didn't go any farther than this. It's like he brought her in and left her lying here, then came back for her and took her somewhere else."

  "That's when he returned the car," Adam said. He looked at Ben, his eyes full of sympathy. "She must have been drugged. That needle we found…"

  "You can't even be sure this isn't just an animal trail!" Ben closed his eyes, not wanting to think of Penny, helpless in some insane bastard's arms. Alone. He'd promised to protect her, dammit!

  "Ben…"

  He looked down to see his sister holding up a small wristwatch. He shook his head. "It's not hers—"

  "Yes, it is, Ben," Jessi said softly, getting to her feet. "Chelsea gave it to her at the party. I know, I helped her pick it out."

  "That Penny. She's leaving us clues, Ben, don't you see it? She must have been okay if she was still with it enough to think of taking off the watch."

  Ben lowered his head. "I should have never let her leave the dojo. I should have stopped her. Damn, I don't know what I was doing, letting myself get so wrapped up in my own pain that I put her at risk. And then the flat tire—"

  "We both know that flat tire was no accident," Adam said softly. "He planned this all out. Left her here, then took Chelsea's car back home, probably hoping we wouldn't even realize Penny was missing until morning. Then he came back here and…" Adam stopped and frowned hard.

  "There had to have been another car," Jessi said. "He must have left one somewhere between here and the ranch." She looked up at the rainy sky, shook her head in disgust. "There might still be some tracks, but not for long. Come on."

  Taking Ben's arm, she dragged him back toward the road. When they reached it, Garrett's pickup was just rolling to a stop, headlights and wipers at full power. He got out, pulling up the hood of his yellow raincoat. Doc clambered out the passenger side, using his black umbrella like a shield, and Ben wondered why Garrett had dragged the poor man all the way out here.

  "Find anything?" Garrett asked.

  Jessi nodded. "Her watch," she said, holding it up.

  Garrett took it from her. "Why don't you and Adam show me where you found this, while Doc here has a talk with Ben?"

  Jessi nodded, and the three took off. Ben looked at Doc, shivering and wet, and reached past him to open the truck's door. "Get back in, Doc," he said. "We can talk just as well where it's dry."

  Nodding hard, Doc climbed back inside, folding and shaking the umbrella. When Ben was settled in the other side and the heater was blasting at full power, Doc said, "I have the results of Penny's blood work, Ben."

  Ben braced himself, squared his shoulders and met Doc's dark eyes. "The HWS?"

  "There is no trace. She's cured, my friend. It is nothing short of a miracle. This Dr. Barlow … he is a genius."

  "He's also a criminal," Ben said.

  "This I know." Doc lowered his head. "And I suspected it to be the case even before Garrett told me about Penny's disappearance. Ben, something else showed up in the blood tests. I thought of it when Penny talked about these headaches of hers. But I had to be sure…"

  "Sure of what?" He watched Doc's face, fearing more bad news.

  "There were traces of a drug called Senitrate in her bloodstream. It … it is a drug that has been banned in most countries. It was written about in all the medical journals not long ago. Something certain government researchers developed for use in the military."

  Ben frowned as he took this in. "What does it do? Cure HWS?"

  "No," Doc said, shaking his head. "We still do not know how Barlow managed that." Drawing a deep breath, Doc went on. "Senitrate, it induces amnesia. If given in high enough doses, the effect can be permanent."

  He could have struck Ben and hurt him less. "Are you saying that animal deliberately took away her memory?"

  Doc nodded. "No doubt he began administering the Senitrate as soon as she came out of the coma. If she remembered you, Ben, she'd have never stayed with him. And if she is one of the few—perhaps even the only patient—he's ever cured successfully, then he'd want to keep her in his care. Study her, too—"

  "Study her? Jesus, Doc, this is my wife, not some lab rat."

  Doc nodded, patting Ben's arm repeatedly. "I know. I know, I'm only telling you what I've learned. And, Ben, if he has her now and can get access to more of the Senitrate…" Again he averted his eyes.

  Ben gripped Doc's arm. "He could erase her memory all over again?"

  The older man nodded shakily. "I'm afraid so."

  "No." Ben pounded his hands on the steering wheel. "No, dammit!" He wrenched the door open and got out, running down the muddy road in the pouring rain until his lungs burned and his heart thundered in his chest. Stopping, breathless, he flung his head back and shouted her name into the storm-tossed sky, making it a cry to the heavens, to the gods if they were listening. And when his breath ran out and the sound of his anguish was swallowed up by the storm, he dropped to his knees in the mud, lowered his head and whispered, "God, Penny, where are you?"

  A heavy hand came down on his shoulder. Garrett's hand. "Doc told me on the way over here … about the drug."

  Ben nodded. "I can't lose her again. Dammit, Garrett, I can't."

  "You won't," Garrett promised.

  Ben shook his head slowly, looking at the ground. "We don't even have a clue which direction they went. They could be anywhere by now."

  "Penny's a handful when she gets her dander up," Garrett said. He gripped Ben's arm and helped him to his feet. "Or she was, when she was younger. And she seems more like the kid she was these days, than the woman she grew into. He'd have one hell of a time taking her far without her drawing notice somehow or another. You know that."

  Ben nodded slowly. "I know that. It's taken me a while to see it … I've been trying to treat her like the helpless, sick woman I lost. When all the time she's been someone else."

  "Yeah. A hellion."

  Ben managed a sad smile that died quickly. "That's why the bastard is shooting her full of drugs to keep her still."

  "Right. But dragging a half-conscious woman around in public would attract just as much notice as hauling a fighting one, don't you think? To say nothing about getting her onto a jet bound for Europe."

  Ben lifted his gaze, searched Garrett's face. "What are you thinking?"

  "I'm thinking he wouldn't bother risking it. Not when he has a supplier out there somewhere for this Senitrate that Doc was talking about. I'm thinking he'd hole up somewhere nearby, keep her quiet and then give her the drug to erase her memory again. After that he could feed her some bull story, and she'd probably believe him. Go where he told her to without fighting him or having to be tranquilized at all."

  Ben listened, but he knew Garrett was only trying to give him some kind of hope to cling to, thin though it was. "That's a pretty wild theory, Garrett. I could come up with a dozen others that have as much basis in fact, including Penny being abducted by aliens."

  "I have a hunch, though," Garrett said.

  Ben shook his head. "Does it matter? We still don't know where he's hiding out with her. Hell, he might have had the drug with him, might have given it to her already."

  "Maybe. But if he didn't, he'd have to get it. And frankly I don't think he'd have risked coming into the country carrying a banned drug. Why would he? He didn't even know if he'd find her or not."

  Ben's head came up. "And if he didn't bring any, he'll have to get some shipped to him."


  "That's right, and he won't risk having it sent to wherever he's staying, in case the drug is discovered. They'd have cops all over the place if it was discovered."

  "So he'd use … what, a P.O. box?"

  "And a fake name. I've got Rangers checking in with every post office in three counties, Ben. Any suspicious packages addressed to new P.O. box customers with overseas return addresses will be checked."

  "And if we do find the Senitrate?"

  "Put it in the post-office box, stake out the place and wait. When he comes for it, we'll follow him back to wherever he's holding Penny."

  Ben sighed deeply. "It's a long shot."

  "It's not the only oar I have in the water, Ben. I've got guys going to hotels flashing photos at the clerks, roadblocks and APB's, but I think the Senitrate is our best lead."

  Ben nodded. "God, I hope so. We have to find her, Garrett. He can't give her any more of that poison." Ben bit his lip when he felt it trembling. "I can't lose her again."

  "I know, Ben. I know."

  Penny drifted in and out of a drug-induced stupor. Every time she woke, he gave her another shot. So she told herself to pretend she was still out, and prayed she'd remember when she next came to.

  And she did. As consciousness slowly returned the next time, she heard her own voice warning her to be still, and she heeded it, even though it was several groggy moments before she remembered why. Then she saw him, sleeping in the second of the twin beds in the room. A hotel room, she guessed. She tried to sit up, and couldn't. Damn. He was asleep. It would be the perfect time to make a run for it.

  But she couldn't. She needed to wait for her strength to seep back into her body. But in the meantime…

  She reached very quietly to the stand beside the bed. If this was a hotel, there would be a notepad and a pen there. Yes. There were both. She drew them quietly toward her.

  Dr. Barlow kept saying she would forget everything again, very soon. If that were true … then there were a few things she needed to get down on paper … things she wanted to remember. So she wrote, in the dark, with a trembling, weak hand. She wrote about the things that mattered most to her, and prayed she'd see these notes again if her memory vanished once more.